Viduthalai pretty much falls into the territory of the series of movies on politics of downtrodden made by the influential three – Vetrimaaran, Pa Ranjith and Mari Selvaraj. Depending on how a viewer sees this or how the filmmaker sees them, it can fall into the category of Dalit Politics, Victim Politics, Politics of Downtrodden or Caste Politics. After I watched the movie (both the parts), my immediate thought was how this movie wants to match upto phenomenal Asuran and searing Karnan. It neither reaches the content and character depths of Asuran, nor makes you empathise with the rage of Karnan.
The film terribly falls short on multiple counts – the film making, the story, the politics behind the story and what not.
Promoting Maoistic Violence
Significant part of the movie is being spent on showing the central character, Perumal Vaathiyar, taking to violence as a remedy to all social ills – both real and perceived. There are lengthy conversations around whether violence is the righteous path to address the challenges, and you’d find that the dialogues are heavily in favour of the violence. Perumal Vaathiyar character justifies the violence. All his immediate subordinates justify the violence. His wife, Mahalakshmi (played by Manju Warrier), who is shown to be a voice of reason, and have significant influence over Perumal Vaathiyar’s action, and is consistent in backing all the violence.
In a sequence involving retribution over the killing of KK, Perumal Vaathiyar’s mentor, she pushes for the murder and killing of the sugar mill owner and his son. People who have not watched the movie will not understand the gravity of her push, since the sugar mill owner is her father, and his son is her own brother.
Anurag Kashyap does a cameo of a leftist from northern India, and his action and dialogues are pretty much indicative of violence as a means to an end. The only inference that I could get from his presence was that he is a Naxal from Northern India, known for all their violence against their own community.
Frankly, I have never seen a movie which has been this explicit in glorifying violent Maoism.
The Irony of Peacenik Re-incarnation of Perumal Vaathiyar
In the second half, there are again scene after scene, where Perumal Vaathiyar seems to have a change of heart, and dissuading his team from violence. All these scenes seem to be Vetrimaran’s slow realisation that his movie is preaching violence. Remember, lot of these scenes seem to happen before the climax portion of the first part, which in itself had bouts of violence from the Makkal Padai, the organisation of Perumal Vaathiyaar.
Just when I thought irony had died a slow death, the lead up to the climax served yet another display of this contradiction. In a lengthy shoot out in the mist-clad hills, after scores of death on both sides (police and Makkal Padai), another bunch of lengthy dialogues from Perumal Vaathiyar about the need to pursue political solution and not violence, and even as he speaks, we see 5 or 6 guys being shot dead. For the group which not just respects Perumal Vaathiyar, but deifies him, all it would have taken was one firm instruction to stop the shooting. But then, Vetrimaaran probably wanted irony to die twice, since it is a two part movie.
Dravidian Ideology in a Communist Glorification
The constant references to the communist ideology as panacea for all social ills can be understood to a great extent considering the periods in which the film’s story is set (and by extension, I am ignoring its irrelevance in today’s context). I don’t understand the need to refer to “Karuppu Sattai” as an ally of “Sevappu Sattai”. Seriously? Are the film makers betting on people not recollecting Kilvenmani Massacre and EVR’s explicit support for the Gopalakrishna Naidu? Wait? Did Vetrimaaran actually forgot that he made a movie called “Asuran” in that backdrop?
And more importantly, when exactly have the Dravidian ideology have fought for the welfare of the downtrodden and labourers? It was always about opposing “Aryans” (a.k.a. North Indians), more specifically peddling hate against Brahmins.
Another scene right at the beginning involves actor Ilavarasu, portraying a minister, saying that they (Dravidian Politicians) had to lay their heads on railway track to get benefits (education?) for the officers in the room. Upfront, I thought it was a sly attack on the D-Stock, till there were more favourable reference to Karuppu Sattai.
The film’s storyline had no need to build or showcase the Karuppu Sattai in any light, be it good or bad. My personal thought was that it was forcibly pushed inside to suit the present day ruler’s agenda. Considering that this movie could end up becoming a loss making proposition (which, it will, for filmmaking reasons detailed later), and that it is distributed by Red Giant movies.
Freudian Slip Anyone?
In one of the scenes involving KK Thozhar (Actor Kishore), where he explains what is “Left Wing Ideology”, he goes about referring to the French Revolution, saying the obvious historic fact – Left Wing were the political group who sat to the left of the Presiding Member’s chair in the French Parliament, and they had opposed the Monarchy and associated veto privileges, and were by extension for “voting and democratic rights”.
In today’s scenario, the principal political group in Tamil Nadu i.e. DMK has rarely embraced any inner party democracy and runs on one family’s writ, the exact opposite of the original “Left Wing Ideology”. If ever there was a ranking of Freudian slips, this takes the Gold.
Film Making Aspects
Lacking in Character Building & Messaging
There are a bunch of scenes that happen in a certain sequence –
- Group of police officers and civil servants discussing bringing in Amudhan as an Officer In Charge of Special Operation, because he is a good guy, who is now in a camp.
- A lecture happening in the camp (Major Madan Cameo) detailing among other things, the significance of human life and the need to avoid human rights violation.
- Cut to the climax, the same officer, Amudhan, who was considered as good by the powers, and who is being trained on human rights, ends up killing the “accused” (Perumal Vaathiyaar) who raises his hands, unarmed and is surrendering.
What exactly is the messaging here? Amudhan is the good guy or the bad guy? That character was shown to have some conscience in the first part, and shown to be without any remorse in the second one.
Jarring Viewing Experience – Overspeaking and Editing
One of the recurring themes with Vetrimaaran’s movie is the overspeaking i.e. where the actual dialogue mouthed during the shooting is entirely different from the one that comes in the final version after dubbing. You’d notice that the words spoken and the lip movements don’t even sync well. I can understand this jarring experience when you watch a dubbed movie or even when a non-native actor does the role, with a native speakers voice being used to dub his or her portion. Vetrimaaran seems to shoot the movie with one set of dialogues and during dubbing changes the dialogues. I experienced this jarring episode even while watching Asuran, and Viduthalai Part 1 and this movie. In addition, there are additional dialogues are spoken after the re-recording and dubbing is also over which sticks out pretty sore.
The editing which used to be pretty good in ensuring continuity and consistency is also terrible here. Every movie watcher will have the confusion on the timelines. In one scene, KK Thozhar dies, and five scenes later, he comes back alive. It is understandable that all these are from the past, but it does not add to any cohesiveness.
My final conclusion is that Vetrimaaran is the same as he was 10 years back. The deterioration in the film making is telling, and he has lost his filmmaking marbles in chasing politically influential storylines and dialogues. From the crystal clear voice that his movies used to carry, it is more of a drunken slur.
Loose Ends
For the bunch of build up the first part had about Soori’s romance with Bhavani Sre, you don’t get to see her for more than a 30 second scene. The first part pretty much ended with police atrocities on the villagers, including punishing them by making them stand nude, and the second part pretty much no references to that or any closure to that atrocity.
Good Things Any?
There are many – the locations, the acting performances, the background music. And it is not the point of this article, and I’d leave it to the bigger group of people who’d orgasm at the smallest good thing in the movie.
Conclusion
To say that this is Vetrimaaran’s weakest movie is an understatement and does not capture my immediate thoughts on this movie. This is inarguably his worst, in all aspects – story, story telling, character depth and film making.
G Saimukundhan is a Chartered Accountant.
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